


at least you're by my side

by milominderbinder



Series: maia's shameless fic a day in the month of may [8]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Cis Girls!Gallavich, F/F, Genderswap, Objectification, Rule 63, Sorority Parties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-08
Updated: 2014-05-08
Packaged: 2018-01-24 01:46:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1587107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/milominderbinder/pseuds/milominderbinder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Since they're finally out to the world as a couple, Lilian doesn't see any problem with taking Micki to one of Lip and Amanda's college parties, and introducing her as her girlfriend.  After all, it's college - everyone there is supposed to be super accepting, right?</p><p>Of course, what Ian has yet to learn is that there a lot of different ways people can be assholes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	at least you're by my side

“Okay, we gotta go.” 

Ian stops halfway through showering Micki with bullets and presses _pause_ on her controller so she can look at up Lip in surprise.

“You’re not staying tonight?” she asks.

Lip and Amanda had turned up that afternoon, just at the same time as Ian had arrived home from a ridiculously long shift at the diner, Micki trailing behind her.  They’d spent most of the day sat at the kitchen table, studying for their rapidly approaching finals while babysitting Liam.  And Ian had just assumed they’d be staying the night, because Lip _always_ stays Friday nights - it’s part of why most people don’t seem to believe he’s actually left home at all.  

“Nah,” says Lip.  He’s helping Amanda shrug into her coat, and doesn’t offer any more explanation than that.

“There’s a party at my sorority,” Amanda elaborates, rolling her eyes at Lip.  “We’ve got to put in an appearance.  It should be fun, though.”

“Yeah,” says Lip, though he doesn’t sound all that convinced.  “Super fun party in the engineering department.”

“ _So,_ what are you guys up to tonight?” Amanda asks, ignoring Lip’s sarcasm.  Ian looks down to the video controller in her hand, then across to Micki, who’s slumped against the couch, looking bored, with a cigarette dangling between her fingers and a slice of pizza halfway to her mouth.

“Pretty much this,” says Ian.  She smiles reflexively; it’s not the kind of thing that would seem special to most people, but Micki’s only been out and proud for a couple of months, and before that these stupid _date nights_ were barely even a pipe dream.  So she’s happy enough with it.

“You could come with us, if you want,” Amanda says.  Her voice is light but sounds sincere, and Ian raises her eyebrows, surprised; she’s never actually been sure Amanda _likes_ her that much, and they’ve only properly met on a few occasions anyway.

Ian _wants_ Amanda to like her, though.  She’s the first girl Lip's really dated that Ian has approved of.  Karen had fucked Lip over at every turn and he’d been totally blind to it, and then Lip had fucked _Mandy_ over at every turn, too, and Mandy’s Ian’s best friend, so she’d never been a supporter of their relationship, since it made her have to pick sides between two of her favourite people.  Amanda seems good for Lip, though - she doesn’t take any of his shit, but doesn’t give him any shit, either.  Ian doesn’t have a clue if they’re gonna go the distance, but for a while at least, they seem to be working well. 

So Ian figures it’s in her best interests if she and Amanda can become at least _friendly_.  Going to a party with her is probably a great way to do that.

Except -

Ian looks over at Micki.  Micki, who, mindreader as she sometimes is, seems to _know_ already what Ian is thinking of saying to the invitation.  And Micki’s glaring at her, half-eaten pizza slice still in her hand, shaking her head ever so slightly.

Ian just stares her down.  She knows Micki hated going to the fancy parties they’d always got invited to back when Ian was dancing for a living, but a college party will surely be different - drink and drugs are sure to abound, which are two of Micki’s favourite things.  And Ian _wants_ to go, which she tells Micki with her eyes.  Micki continues to stare back for several long seconds before she sighs and looks away, shrugging moodily.

Grinning in victory, Ian turns back around to Amanda and Lip.

“Yeah, we’d love to.”

\--

When they get to the party, Micki keeps her fingers hooked into the belt loops on the back of Ian’s jeans.  She seems - not lost, exactly, because she’s scowling too aggressively to be _lost,_ but definitely on edge.  Ian doesn’t even try to leave her alone, just rolls her eyes a lot at her girlfriend’s antics and lets Micki follow a half step behind her the whole time.

The party isn’t quite as wild as Ian had been expecting, and she has a feeling Lip had been right with his assessment of the engineering majors.  There’s plenty of booze floating around, but the music is quiet and there aren’t too many people, most of them seemingly contained to one room.  Amanda flits between Lip and her friends, and Ian sticks by Lip, too.

With every new person Lip introduces them to as _my sister and her girlfriend,_ Micki seems to relax a little bit more.

\--

They’ve been there about an hour, and Micki’s almost completely let go of Ian’s beltloops and is even nursing a beer, when the guy comes over.

He seems to know Lip, greets him with a hive five and a jovial grunt, and then rounds on Ian and Micki.

“See you brought some fresh meat,” he says, smiling jokingly.  Ian tries her very hardest not to roll her eyes.

“Yeah,” says Lip, throwing an arm around Ian’s shoulders and ruffling her hair, laughing as she tries to squirm away from him.  “This is my little sister Ian, and her, uh, girlfriend, Micki.”

Micki just scowls, but the guy’s expression lights up.

“Lesbians?  Nice!  Hey, you know what’d _really_ get this party going - if you guys made out right now.”

Ian feels her jaw drop.  The guy actually seems _serious,_ is grinning creepily like he doesn’t have a fucking _clue_ he just said something bad.  For a second, Ian’s so stunned that she actually forgets Micki’s there next to her.

That’s her fatal mistake.  Because before Ian knows what’s happening, Micki’s punching the guy in the face.

He stumbles back with a yell of surprise, hands flying up to his nose as blood starts spurting out of it.  All the noise in the room seems to suddenly stop, everyone spinning to face the fight.  Ian thinks they’re probably not expecting the smallest girl in the room to be the perpetrator, but Micki isn’t deterred by that.  She takes another step towards the guy, nearly fucking _growls._

“Guess what, fucker,” she says, and then slams her fist into his face again.  “We don’t exist for _your_ amusement, we’ve been through too _fucking_ much for that, so you better back off unless you wanna fucking die.”

Then she kicks him in the balls.

\--

Ten minutes later, Ian and Mickey are sat in the sorority house kitchen, and Ian’s holding a napkin filled with ice against Micki’s knuckles.

“I’m fine,” Micki grumps, but lets Ian do it anyway, and when Ian brushes the hair out of her eyes she sees the way Micki leans a little into the touch.  The fight wasn’t much of a fight _physically,_ but Ian knows what it was _about_ must be getting to Micki more than she’ll try and let on.  They’ve been through enough of this shit already, and with Terry in jail, they thought they’d be getting a reprieve from the worst of the hate.  As it turns out, they’ve just had to deal with a different kind; the guys at the Alibi who leer at them when they sit together, people catcalling if they kiss in the street, Mickey’s brothers’ friends begging them for a threesome.  In a way, it’s nothing compared to the shit they’ve already gone through, the impossible horrors they’ve suffered from Terry, and from others as well, who think people like them are _sick._ In a way, though, it’s even worse, this - trivialisation, of their relationship.  At least the people who hate them for being in love are recognising that they really _are_.

“You do know not _everyone_ in the world is an asshole, right?  Even if it seems that way?” Ian asks after a moment.  It seems dumb - of course Micki should know that, it kind of goes without saying, it’s statistically impossible for _everyone_ in the world to suck.  But - well.  Micki hasn’t ever really been exposed to anyone who wasn’t awful, in at least some way.  Micki hasn’t had a single person in her life who hasn’t screwed her over at some point or another, and when Ian thinks about that, she just gets so fucking _sad._

Micki stares at her, for a few long seconds.  The noise of the party is filtering, muffled, through the kitchen door, but somehow it still seems silent.  And then -

“Course I do,” says Micki, rolling her eyes, smiling.  “You’re not.”

Ian rubs her thumb against Micki’s lips, and smiles back.

**Author's Note:**

> for the fic-a-day-in-may, and a continuation of my ever-growing genderswap obsession.
> 
> check out [this post](http://mickeymilk.tumblr.com/post/84939238470/notes-from-a-genderswap-nobody-ever-calls-ian-by) if you wanna see how ian and micki look in this verse, plus some little bits and pieces of my headcanons!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [at least you're by my side](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3674220) by [KittyKate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyKate/pseuds/KittyKate)




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